Account of a Tour in Normandy, Volume 1 eBook

We, East Angles, are accustomed to admire the
remains of Norman architecture, which, in our counties,
are perhaps more numerous and singular than in any
other tract in England. The noble castle of Blanchefleur
still honors our provincial metropolis, and although
devouring eld hath impaired her charms and converted
her into a very dusky beauty, the fretted walls still
possess an air of antique magnificence which we seek
in vain when we contemplate the towers of Julius or
the frowning dungeons of Gundulph. Our cathedral
retains the pristine character which was given to
the edifice, when the Norman prelate abandoned the
seat of the Saxon bishop, and commanded the Saxon
clerks to migrate into the city protected or inclosed
by the garrison of his cognate conquerors. Even
our villages abound with these monuments. The
humbler, though not less sacred structures in which
the voice of prayer and praise has been heard during
so many generations, equally bear witness to Norman
art, and, I may say, to Norman piety; and when we
enter the sheltered porch, we behold the fantastic
sculpture and varied foliage, encircling the arch
which arose when our land was ruled by the Norman
dynasty.

Comparatively speaking, Rouen is barren indeed of
such relics. Its military antiquities are swept
away; and the only specimens of early ecclesiastical
architecture are found in the churches of St. Paul
and St. Gervais, both of them, in themselves, unimportant
buildings, and both so disfigured by subsequent alterations,
that they might easily escape the notice of any but
an experienced eye. Of these, the first is situated
by the side of the road to Paris, under Mont Ste.
Catherine, yet, still upon an eminence, beneath which
are some mineral springs, that were long famous for
their medicinal qualities, but have of late years
been abandoned, and the spa-drinkers now resort to
others in the quarter of the town called de la
Marequerie. Both the one and the other are
highly ferruginous, but the latter most strongly impregnated
with iron.

The chancel is the only ancient part of the present
church of St. Paul’s, and even this must be
comparatively modern, if any confidence may be placed
in the current tradition, that the building, in its
original state, was a temple of Adonis or of Venus,
to both which divinities the early inhabitants of
Rouen are reported to have paid peculiar homage.
They were worshipped in vice and impurity[63]; nor
were the votaries deterred by the evil spirits who
haunted the immediate vicinity of the temple, and
who gave rise to so fetid and infectious a vapor,
that it often proved fatal! This very remark seems
to indicate the scite of the church of St. Paul, with
its neighboring sulphureous waters. St. Romain
demolished the temple, and dispersed the sinners.
Farin, in his History of Rouen[64], says, that
the church was repeatedly destroyed and rebuilt by
the Norman Dukes, to some of whom, the chancel, which